DoesItAgeVerify: The age verification status of Open Source Operating Systems

twiclo

Can anyone tell me exactly what these laws do? Is it just going to ask for a birthday when I run `adduser`? What's the point? Is it meant for one admin account to restrict other user accounts?

iamnothere

This seems to be a shorter list than the one collected by Ageless Linux ( https://agelesslinux.org/distros.html ), although the GH issues seem to have the status of some additional distros. See also https://github.com/AntiSurv/oss-anti-surveillance for a project to patch out any future age verification code.

devsda

I guess this can potentially make it easy for the overzealous lawmakers & individuals harass those os/distributions to introduce age verification. I prefer a satirical 'ShouldItAgeVerify' page that points the ridiculousness of shoving verification at unexpected places.

tuananh

what if a distro uses systemd and systemd implements age verification?

kennywinker

The omarchy statement is just DHH dropping the r-word in a DM. I love omarchy, but manchild/edgelord behaviour from the lead doesn’t exactly instill confidence.

amarant

I... Kinda think this will work out ok? Hear me out: Linux is open source. Someone's gonna make an application/kernelmodule that lets you configure your reported age on a application/website basis. In some jurisdictions it's illegal to target kids with advertisement, and I believe also to track them? Reporting your age as 8-12 is gonna be the new, but actually functional "no tracking" header.

bethekidyouwant

The browser needs to actually read this for it to be meaningful. Where is that list?

starkeeper

So once an OS has your age then what it is just handed out to sites so they can target children for better kidnapping?

ericls

lol, why not just createa law and state that "people must be happy, environment must be good, everyone must get along with everyone, also no wars". Law doesn't work like this. This is not law, this is impersonating God, or a bad prompt to LLM I guess.

wpollock

Age verification is simple! A Kelvar strap must be attached to the user before the device will power up. A probe in the strap takes a drop of blood from the user and analyzes the protein markers to determine the user's age. (See the Stanford U. study for details.) Surprised G. Orwell or A. Huxley didn't think of it first.

gorgoiler

I read some of the Ubuntu thread about potential implementations and it sure made me pine for some rose tinted good old days when AccountsServices, xdg-portals, dbus, systemd-login, et al. weren’t things one had to know or care about. Everything seems so complicated these days.

1vuio0pswjnm7

If it's open source then the user can remove "age verification" before compiling Or the user can compile a version that predates "age verification"